I recently started reading the new biography of Jerry Garcia by journalist and biographer Jim Newton. What first intrigued me about the book is that Newton, while a fan, is not an insider. Most of the many books about the Dead that have been published since Garcia’s death were written by insiders of one sort or another. Those sorts of books, especially memoirs by the band members themselves, are obviously great to read for big fans. However, I am now interested in reading a more distanced view.

I just started the book, but there are a few things I have already learned about Jerry.

  1. Jerry’s dad was a musician, but gave it up to run a bar in San Francisco.
  2. His father died when Jerry was only 5 years old. They left to go on a fishing trip and his dad drowned, so young Jerry had come home from that trip along with his mother, stunned by the sudden death of the family patriarch. I imagine that would have been an immensely difficult situation for such a young kid.
  3. Shortly after the passing of Jerry’s dad, he and his older brother moved in with their grandparents and Jerry’s grandfather sounds like a shitty grandparent. Jerry’s memory of his grandfather was apparently pretty negative. Considering the grandparents were taking the boys in after their father had died, it strikes me as particularly pathetic behavior.
  4. Jerry’s grandmother had other boyfriends while she stayed married to Jerry’s grandfather. Bill, Jerry’s grandfather, beat his wife once and after that she initiated what sounds like a Catholic divorce; essentially separated, but living in the same house.

I am less than ten pages in so I expect there is much more to learn about Garcia. If you are a Deadhead, check it out.